


Dark Clouds

by Mandalorianess



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Angst, Angst with a Hopeful Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Death, F/M, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:14:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28535721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mandalorianess/pseuds/Mandalorianess
Summary: Despite her obviously well-trained muscles she looks fragile somehow, like she could break any moment. He can’t help but let his gaze wander over her gorgeous, but wounded body. He can’t resist her spell as she gracefully dunks the back of her head into the water to free her hair from blood and dirt.‘Like a Mandalorian goddess,’it flashes through his mind.
Relationships: Din Djarin/Cara Dune
Comments: 16
Kudos: 63





	Dark Clouds

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for proofreading [Wolfy22](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wolfy22/pseuds/Wolfy22)

The atmosphere between Cara and her four other teammates is tense and their risky mission, on a small and still completely Imperial-controlled planet, is not the only reason for the passive-aggressive tension.  
She had hoped that it would get better with time, but it didn’t it only got worse. Her team hates her, and she would lie if she’d say that she still trusts them. They don’t trust her anymore either. They are blinded by rage, and lusting for revenge just like she was until only a few weeks ago... Until she made the mistake of sleeping with the wrong guy and lost all her men’s respect, but still somehow that mistake opened her eyes, in a way she had never expected. 

One of her team members places antipersonnel mines in front of the big Imperial congress building, she and the three other men were already in position behind a small wall, ready to take out the high Imperial officers who were supposed to leave the building in less than five minutes.  
“Sad you can’t fuck them too because they will be dead soon?” One of them asks her with spiteful laughter, the other two join the laughter, looking at her with deprecating glances...

She swallows hard, but doesn’t say anything. So, that’s how they are seeing her, as an Imperial slut.

Vance, the one who placed the mines just returned, when Cara sees them, first only shortly out of the corner of her eye, kids! They are running after a ball directly toward the minefield.

“We have to stop them” she hisses, already about to jump out of her covers.

“So, you’re not only fucking Imps now, Dune, you also protect them?” Vance asks with disgust.

“They’re kids, they’re not Imps” she’s shocked by the cold look in her team’s eyes, even though she knows she used to have that look too. Ready to kill every single being that could be associated with the Empire.

“Of course, they are Imps, look at them. If they were the children of rebels they wouldn’t be freely playing here” 

Suddenly, her body just reacts almost without her consent, she runs toward the playing kids, screaming they have to go, but it’s too late. The big double swing door of the congress building opens and masses of high ranks walk out. 

The shock wave throws her through the air. When she lands on the hard macadam ground, she feels how the air gets pressed out of her lungs with burning pain. She can’t breathe, she can’t see, she can’t hear.  
She doesn’t even realize how her body slides a few more meters over the ground, causing the crushed rocks to scrape her back. She doesn’t feel how a shrapnel slits open her left forearm. 

Her ears are still ringing when she’s finally able to sit up again. Through the slowly disappearing smoke, she can see the dead bodies, of Imps and children. She wants to cry and scream with guilt and desperation, but she doesn’t. She stands up and walks back to her team still hidden behind the shallow wall, like the good soldier she is. 

They don’t even look at her, so she just walks by without a word, toward their meeting point where the small drop ship is probably already waiting for them.  
When she turns around one last time, the last thing she sees before Vance hits her head with his weapon is stormtroopers walking out of the building, looking for them.

She slumps down to the ground, her vision already black but her mind not completely out yet.

“Traitor” she hears one of her men, she can’t make out the voice, before finally her mind is overpowered by the all-encompassing darkness too.

She couldn’t have been out more them a few minutes, stormtroopers are already running in her direction, her weapons are gone. 

Out of instinct, she starts running too, even though her body feels like she would break down again any second. The only thing that keeps her on her feet is the rush of adrenaline pumping through her veins. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees the small drop ship flying up into the sky...without her.

“Kriff” she hisses, tumbling down an abyss, blood running down her arm, her shirt sticking to the scratches on her back. She wipes the back of her hand over her sweaty forehead only to find it covered in blood too. 

She keeps running, thousands of thoughts spinning through her mind.

Her team had deceived her and now both the Empire and the New Republic are after her, she is sure they told their superiors that she’s a traitor. 

Like by command her face pops up on one of the monstrous displays on the congress building. “Wanted — reward: 10.000 credits,” says the text under her portrait.

_‘I’ll never leave that planet alive, and even if I do, I won’t have a single minute of sleep again’_

The empire wants her to torture information about the Rebellion out of her, the New Republic wants her because they think she works with the enemy now.

She looks behind herself – no stormtroopers anymore.

She lets herself sink to the ground against a tree. Burning pain slowly replaces the adrenaline rush, caused by her sudden flight.

Her thoughts wander back to her family when Alderaan was still there...what would her mother have told her? What would her father have told her? What would her older brother have told her?

Her mother would have told her to take care of herself, she had been always so worried about her little girl.  
Her dad would have told her to do what needed to be done... But what needs to be done?  
“You know what to do Carasynthia, you always do” she hears her brother's soft voice, and she instantly wishes he would hug her one last time.

She still believes in the rebellion, she still believes in revenge for Alderaan, so under no circumstances, she can be captured by imps. She wants to die on her own conditions, not after she accidentally slips some information or dies after months of imperial torture.

She shivers and only now she realizes that it had started to snow.

 _‘There’s no need for me to live’_ she suddenly realizes, and to her shock, she isn’t afraid she’s relieved.  
She had been alive only to fight, to avenge the destruction of her planet, to avenge the death of her loved ones. 

She stumbles through the wild snowflakes and the ground is already covered with a thin white layer when she finally reaches the lake, she has seen on their flight to this mission. 

It looks peaceful, almost a bit like the lake behind her family’s house.

 _‘A good place to die’_ she thinks.

The big trees of the surrounding forest already cast large and dark shadows over the lake, the sun has set, and the remaining slightly violet light will disappear soon.

The glittering moonlight, reflecting on the dark water surface makes this place seem almost magical.  
The unbearable desire to wash off all the blood and dirt of this day forms in Cara. 

Slowly almost careful she strips out of her clothes, leaving her freezing and only in underwear. Big fuzzy snowflakes set on her black hair, generating a harsh contrast, while she unbraids it.

There is no reason for her to live any longer, she can’t fight for the Rebellion anymore, she has no purpose.  
_‘Just a waste of space_ ’ That’s what her life is now.  
There is no sense in staying alive, in suffering and mourning any longer.

The water almost seems to call her, and she suddenly feels so attracted to the dark mass, mirroring the silver moonlight.  
She makes a cautious step into the water, causing the filmy ice layer to break.

Slowly, step by step she walks into the freezing liquid. It’s even colder than she expected, and she involuntarily begins to shiver, still, she continues to walk deeper into the water until it caresses her waist with icy little waves.

The cold is numbing the burning pain the water causes at the scrapes on her back. Still, she hisses in pain when she lowers her forearms under the water surface, causing the shrapnel cut to bleed again. 

For a while, the aching cold and the pain caused by her injuries overpower the storm of betrayal, hurt, and sadness inside her.  
A slight breeze causes her pale skin to form goosebumps. 

She slightly crouches and leans back her head until all her hair is covered with water. With her fingers, she combs through the strands floating in the water to wash away the blood and dirt.

She enjoys the cold, taking more and more possession of her tattered body.  
With her remaining power, she slightly pushes herself off the ground with her feet to let herself drift in the water. 

She doesn't know how long she had been lying on the glittering surface of the water when the cold turns into lingering numbness, and suddenly, she misses Alderaan, her family, and friends even more intensely.  
Without them, without the rebellion, she is nobody. No one would ever miss her, her death wouldn’t hurt a single being because all the people that used to love or like her, were dead or hated her... 

Dark clouds suddenly obscure the moon's light, giving her the feeling of disappearing into the darkness. Ever since the destruction of Alderaan she had the feeling of fading more and more, she was only a shadow of the person she used to be.

She exhaled until she feels like she has squeezed all the air out of her lung, and lets herself sink under the cold water surface. 

Sinking deeper and deeper, no pain, no fear, no hate, no rage, only cold and numbness - She is finally free! 

_‘Maybe the surface will just freeze and then there is no going back’_ she hopes, and suddenly, she doesn’t even feel that cold anymore, the all-consuming darkness almost welcomes her with warmth.

***

Din doesn't know why, but his steps steer him toward the lake he had discovered when he landed the Razor Crest on his destination planet. The sparkling moonlight dances on the moving surface of the water and when he reaches the edge of the clearing, he can see a female figure in the water, her dark hair reaching almost over her hips, the water hugging her slim waist. She!'s only wearing a bra, highlighting her remarkable curves. 

_‘She’s beautiful’_ he thinks as the woman turns in his direction.  
Quickly almost out of reflex, he hides in the shadows of the forest. It doesn’t seem like she noticed him, and he exhales with relief.

Despite her obviously well-trained muscles she looks fragile somehow, like she could break any moment. He can’t help but let his gaze wander over her gorgeous, but wounded body. He can’t resist her spell as she gracefully dunks the back of her head into the water to free her hair from blood and dirt.

 _‘Like a Mandalorian goddess,’_ it flashes through his mind. 

He wants to turn away, he really tries, knows it’s wrong to exploit her ignorance to watch her float on the silver glistening water surface, but he can't digress his gaze from her.  
An irrational fear that she could simply disappear as soon as he turns around spreads in his guts.

 _‘Don’t be silly, Din’_ he scolds himself.

When he finally gathers himself and turns his back on the lake, he can’t help but turn around one last time.  
His searching gaze glides over the reflecting surface of the lake, but she disappeared... Submerged.

He’s waiting for her to reappear, but nothing happens, and the water slowly calms down from her movements. 

Discomfort spreads in Din, no one should stay underwater for so long.  
The whole situation seems so unreal, and he hopes that he’ll just wake up from a nightmare or that she at least would come up to breathe again...but neither happens. 

Determined, he adjusts some settings on his helmet and steps into the water. The slight noise of the crackling ice layer that has already formed at the verge of the lake disrupts the smothering silence of the night. 

Without hesitation, he dives under the surface, water gathering in his helmet, blurring his sight, and burning in his eyes. It takes him a few moments until he can identify her vague silhouette drifting motionlessly in the icy water. Frantically, he dives a little deeper to grab her. 

As soon as he pulls her to the surface, he hastily pants for air, only to find out the next moment that any tension had eased from the body in his arms.

He drags her to the shore, desperately calling for her to wake up. She is so pale and cold, her lips colored with an icy blueish tone.

The suffocating feeling of panic blocks his mind, he doesn’t know why this situation distresses him so much. He doesn’t even know that woman, he had seen dead people before, even killed people.

 _'Pull yourself together,'_ he admonishes himself in his thoughts ‘Maybe she is still alive’.

With trembling fingers, he gropes for her pulse ... Nothing. He breathes deeply. 

_'Keep calm.'_

Just when he’s sure that she’s gone, he finally feels her pulse. Slow and feeble, but it’s there.

He exhales in relief; her pulse was probably never gone he just hasn’t noticed it in his anxiety.  
He looks around for her clothes and finally finds them, totally snowed in, and soaked through. He puts her clothes in the also snow-covered backpack of hers and shoulders it with a smooth movement before he finally returns to the still unconscious woman. 

Only now does he notice that he is freezing in his soaked clothes and armor too. 

Determined, he stands up with the limp body of the Mandalorian goddess in his arms and carries her the short walk back to his ship.  
***

She slightly blinks against the dim light, the wonderful smell of caf fills her nostrils. The blanket covering her feels warm and cozy, even though her body hurts like hell. When her eyes finally adapt to the light, she realizes that she’s never seen the room surrounding her before, she isn’t even wearing her own clothes. 

The warm and fluffy hoodie she wears is probably one or two sizes too large and scarcely reaches over her butt when she stands up.

 _‘Where am I?’_ she wonders.  
Slowly the events of the previous day come back to her mind – weren’t she supposed to be dead? 

She looks around and sees her clothes through the open door of the small sleeping compartment, neatly hanging over a clothesline in the next room.

It almost looks like she’s on an old spaceship, but how?

Slowly she rolls up the left sleeve of the hoodie and finds a tidy gauze bandage wrapped around her wound. She feels for the cut on her forehead, but it’s covered with a compress, the same applies to the wounds on her back. 

“Kriff” she mumbles, she wanted to die and know some mysterious stranger saved her like a fairy tale knight in shining armor. 

She didn’t know how accurate her description of the unwanted savior was until she entered the cockpit of the indeed very old spaceship and found a man covered in Beskar armor from head to toe.

She would have laughed if she weren’t so furious. How dared he to decide whether she would die or live? 

“You’re awake,” The stranger says, slightly modulated through his helmet.  
His voice is soft and warm, and she feels how her anger already starts to withdraw a little against her will. She wants to be mad at him.

“Why?” she asks, staring directly at his visor.

“I just I...”

“So, you didn’t even think about it?” She scoffs. “I’m gonna die anyway, and you just ruined my attempt to do so on my own conditions” she spits, her eyes gleaming with a new wave of anger and disappointment.

“Why would you die anyway? Are you sick or...” The worried tone in his voice, again calms her rage.

“I’m not sick, I’m just not safe anywhere anymore, and I don’t wanna live a life like that, with only flight as a purpose” she answers before he can make more false assumptions.

“But you are a rebel soldier, aren’t you?” he points at her face tattoo and then at her arm, where her stripes are covered by his hoodie

“You’ve seen them” She teases, suddenly feeling more like herself again.

“I mean I had to...I didn’t see anything...” he stammers, waving his hands awkwardly in front of her boobs.

“Yeah, sure” She laughs, she’s quite certain that under his helmet his probably blushing right now.

“I’m not part of the rebellion anymore” she eventually answers his question and suddenly, she feels the overwhelming urge to tell him the whole story, she doesn’t know why. Maybe so someone will hear of the injustice she has experienced or to get some sort of absolution that she hasn’t done something wrong, she isn’t sure.

***

“I’ve learned one thing at the moment I found out that he was Imperial...” She sighs after she told him everything and he had just listened, without judging, without inappropriately cheering comments.

“People are more than their political beliefs” she continues “You know, I really liked him, he was nice and we both knew it would be only a one-time thing, apparently he must have known that I’m a rebel” she gestures toward her rebel insignia tattoo “But he didn’t care... That moment I understood why it is okay to kill Imps wearing their uniform but not during their free time” she pauses for a moment, looking down at her feet.

“Uniforms reduce people to only their political duties...” She ends, finally looking at him again.

“Maybe you should try bounty hunting, it’s what I do for a living, I’m sure the Guild could use someone like you” he offers after a while of comfortable silence

She laughs “The Guild, really? I’m sure I’m already on their list by now”

“Well, you know, if you are good enough, they’ll happily clear your chain code to employ you” he argues and Cara isn’t quite sure why this man who barely even knows her tries to keep her from committing suicide and even invites her to be some kind of coworker

“Even if I’d try and join the guild, which I’m not...The Empire or maybe even the New Republic will catch me in no time” She argues “I don’t have a ship and even if I had one, I wouldn’t know how to fly it” she admits.

“You can choose which bounties you take, you don’t have to take imperial bounties,” he hesitates “and you could fly with me for a while, I just parted from my previous crew and I assume as a former rebel shock trooper you’re a capable fighter” he offers.

“You have no idea” she teases “but seriously why would you do that, offering a stranger to live on your ship? I could be hired to kill you”

He slightly tilts his helmeted head.

“I don’t know” he says “I just got a feeling we’d make a good team” 

She slowly nods, it’s worth a try, she could take only jobs that support the rebellion, and maybe, if this tin can was right, they could actually clear her chain code.

“I have to warn you though, it’s a mostly male-dominated profession” Din admits causing Cara to laugh.

“Less than 24 hours ago I’ve been a shock trooper, remember?” She asks rhetorically “You don’t think we were a bunch of princesses braiding our hair and waiting for our knight in shining armor, don’t you?” She teases.

“Right” he nods “Sorry”

“I’m Cara,” she says offering him his hand.

“Din” he answers finally clasping her hand.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you liked it even though it was angsty
> 
> As always I'm super grateful for every comment even if it's _'just'_ a smiley :)


End file.
